A group of biologists and other scientists from the Mexican state of Veracruz, held an explosive press conference on Aug. 19 in Xalapa, the state capital, to denounce the anti-scientific fraud of man-made global warming. ``Environmentalist organizations and groups have emerged, the majority of them sponsored by the United Kingdom, that have influenced legislation in many countries to impose policies to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions,'' Dr. Omar Pensado, biologist and director of the Institute of Advanced Sciences of Xalapa, Veracruz, explained on behalf of the group. ``It is fundamental to prevent certain groups from making climate change science a dogma that can't be questioned, and which borders on the creation of a new religion that is an attack on the human species, that is to say, eco-fascism with a green face that endangers current civilization."

Pensado, whose specialty is astrobiology and who has worked on various proposals for the terra-forming of Mars, delivered a prepared statement on behalf of his Institute, the Veracruz Federation of Biologists and Environment Professionals, the Aguirre Beltran Society of Biologists, and other groups. Their charges, and call to action, have already produced an uproar among Al Gore's friends both in Veracruz and nationally.

In his prepared remarks, Dr. Pensado explained:

``We support and agree with the more than 32,000 scientists of various countries, who have stated before the United Nations,'' that there is no scientific proof that ``man-made carbon-dioxide [is the cause of] climate variation on the planet,'' as well as ``the 650 scientists who have testified before the Senate of the United States,'' and the 50 NASA scientists who have denounced the lack of evidence for those theories. Pensado went on to challenge the IPCC in particular, saying that ``variations of heat emission from the Sun, and in the inclination of the axis of our planet,'' are the probable cause of the diverse climatic periods that Earth has undergone. . . This implies a new vies of public policies regarding climate change, seen as cosmic events.''

Pensado called for the state of Veracruz to change its environmental laws, because current policies have:

1) ``spent millions of pesos on programs for climate change mitigation, which were based on a series of erroneous ideas;''

2) ``put a brake on industrial and agricultural activity of Third World countries, in detriment of production, job creation, and services;

3) ``not taken appropriate measures . . . [to address] extraordinary solar activity of a cyclical nature, of short duration but with very serious consequences.''

The statement goes on to say that their proposal ``is also a defense of human beings as the highest creation of nature, whose greatest achievement is our current civilization. . . We are very concerned that, were carbon-dioxide mitigation plans to be implemented in agriculture and animal husbandry, given that the main policy of the IPCC is to reduce the area of those activities, the only thing that Veracruz will get as a result is poverty and hunger.''

The statement concludes by denouncing environmental organization for ``accusing man of being a generator of carbon dioxide, and they therefore call for population reduction to save the planet from global warming. . . These retrograde ideas, in a world suffering hunger, are evil. Reducing the area used for crops and livestock in a poor country will only lead to hunger: Man comes first. Theirs is a defense of the planet at the expense of human beings which, in fact, are the highest creation of nature. . . Our national development should not be subject to any empire nor any `environmentalist religion.' . . . There may be external forces that would like to see us return to hunting and gathering, in order to save the planet, that is to say, return to atrocious poverty, to atrocious ignorance, in order to then argue that our existence isn't justified. We must not allow that. Our civilization is based on high energy, and to go backwards would only collapse what has already been established and won by the effort of humanity over centuries.''